Don't be so fast to criticize President Trump for not berating Putin: Letters

Hatred factors into Trump criticism

The outrage as a consequence to President Trump's Helsinki summit with Vladimir Putin is understandable. Putin has been ruling Russia with an iron fist for quite a long time now, and he's not to be trusted. The suspicions that Trump is or has been in collusion with Russia, however, remain absurd.

Two to three days before the Helsinki summit, Trump was outraging the world's press by bluntly scolding Germany at the NATO summit for becoming too cozy with Russia for its natural gas supply, not a small matter as Russia is highly dependent on its energy exports. Though easy for Trump to halt, he has kept sanctions against Russia that have been in place since before his administration. He has ordered our destroyers to fire on Russia's close ally, Syria, after Syria reportedly used chemical weapons against its own people in April 2017.

U.S. and Russian fighter jets have been close to exchanging fire for the past few years over Syria, which could easily escalate us into war with Russia. Scold away at Trump for not thinking before he speaks, but the foam-mouthed hysterics we see on cable TV and reflected in some of the media is a consequence of white-hot hatred for the president and nothing more.

Russia has about as many nuclear weapons as the U.S., so let's not be so cavalier in our insistence that Trump berate Putin to his face.

Chuck MarshallClermont

America is now unrecognizable

Whatever happened to the “land of the free and the home of the brave?” Where did the country go that was the refuge for the persecuted, victimized people of the world? Who have we become? It appears we have turned into the very people we used to condemn for their actions.

Our president bullies, curses, encourages violence, alienates our allies and cozies up to dictators. This has encouraged others to behave in a like manner. To make it worse, even some of those who criticized the president’s words and actions have decided to act like him in response.

This country, at least those people in power, turn away immigrants based solely on their religion, assuming they are terrorists. Families escaping devastating lives are ripped apart. Religious freedom no longer matters, except for Christians. Rule of law has become obsolete, as we are told we don’t need judges to make judgments about the validity of asylum seekers.

Personal freedom is being curtailed, and these decisions are upheld in the courts. It is terrifying and humiliating to watch and to know that those of us who believe in kindness, civility and honesty are basically powerless. The ballot box, peaceful demonstrations, unbiased reporting were the ways to make change in the past so we could move forward. Instead we are opting for violence and bigotry. We are contradicting everything we used to hold dear. Is this really who we want to be?

Sad.

Maggie O’Connell Orlando

More good news, please

The story of Natalie Nugent, the Orlando fifth-grader on her school's Safety Patrol who won a national award for saving the lives of seven kindergarten children last year, got a tiny mention in the local section of Wednesday's Sentinel (“Fifth-grader lauded for saving lives”). How about revisiting her story and giving her front-page attention? She deserves it. And the rest of us need some good news.